الممارسات اللّغويّة
Volume 11, Numéro 4, Pages 7-36
2020-12-10

Contemporary Arabic Language Dictionary By: Aḥmad Muxtār Cumar & Teamwork A Reading In The Title, Introduction, And The Text

الكاتب : عطا الله إلياس .

الملخص

Abstract: This study is a critical reading of the Contemporary Arabic Language Dictionary by Aḥmad Muxtār ‘Umar and Others. It aims to examine aspects of shortcomings and defects in the Dictionary, by arguing that language contemporariness has to be comprehensive and blameless, with no shortcomings or faults because of selectivity, regional, geographical, statistical, personal, or chastity restraints. This study demonstrates that the Dictionary lexicographers have excluded numerous words, despite the fact that these words are commonly used in written as well as in spoken Arabic, even in colloquial Egyptian itself. This critical “Reading” of the Dictionary argues that the lexicographers make unfair, and inaccurate judgements of previous dictionaries. The lexicographers claim that the initial idea of a new dictionary was to avoid the shortcomings of previous dictionaries. This study maintains that this claim and judgements are inadmissible and refuted. A careful reading shows that the Dictionary contains similar defects, such as “copaste” (copy and paste), imitation, lack of thorough examination, and confusion of the old with the new. As for the lexicographers’ claim that they arrived at new results that previous dictionaries failed to list, it is refuted as not reliable. Finally this “Reading” insists that the most critical and serious problem of the Dictionary lies in its old- new agenda: that is the standardization of the spoken and colloquial Egyptian, in order to make it the language of literature and all the Arabs.

الكلمات المفتاحية

Contemporary Arabic Language, Corpus, Falsehood of circulation, Criticism of precursors, Chastity, Shortcomings, Standardization of colloquial Egyptian